Remember, and
by azriel.infinite
Summary: You know what you are, but know not what you may be. set in Xanxus' POV.


&

You think he said he'll come back for you. You think he means what he said, and it's nothing like what some of the words that you vomit from your cup of lips just because you'd like to see him crumple and fall to the ground, defeated; but only to regain his strength and push himself forward, closer to your burning light.

They say that hearing's the last thing that goes before you die. So before you enter that second state of unbeing, before you get introduced to Death's second self, you clenched your fists and listened, listened carefully to what he said for the final time in between all times because there are some things that are easier to lose and let go of. But not this. Not the memory of hands that tried to pull you up on a windy day when you were younger; not the voice that grated upon broken floors just so that they can reach you, and let you know what you've been trying to blot out of your mind from the past eight years of your life: _it's not over. It's not over. Boss, I won't let everything end like this! This is not how the world ends. This is not how the world ends. This is not how--_

This is not how the world ends. You don't need to hear the bang; you can't even stand hearing whimpers.

* * *

Once upon a time, once upon a time --

(when everything wasn't frozen and you were young, like all shades without colour or hollow men were)

Once upon a time, you felt that you've looked through the world with one baleful eye and pronounced it dead, weary and unprofitable no matter how it seemed. You know you had money, you know your father's rich; you know you're next in line to inherit the scepter from his hands and wield it like the stone image of a mighty god. Therefore it wasn't surprising when other people from different _famiglia_ step out to throw their supplications at you behind thinly veiled threats of praise and flattery: how kind you are, master Xanxus, how very much _unlike_ your father; but good nevertheless, very good, better than him -- a perfect candidate for a leader, the only candidate, and so on.

You swallow all praises and feed it to yourself.

And then there was this boy who followed you everywhere like an annoying mutt, the kind that you've kicked so many times underneath a stormy day when all raindrops fell sharply like needles on the skin: that dog that whimpers, bares its fangs, but ultimately submits to you anyway and still comes back no matter how hard you force it away.

"One day you'll be pleased that I pledged myself to you," he said, burning with enthusiasm that made him effulgent in a sunny afternoon in a balcony, the pale light shining on his hair and lighting his eyes with a burning flame, almost raging in its faithfulness, dangerous like yours. This is the boy, the one you thought was following you for some hope of money or grandeur or chance of praise or promotion; the one who forms prayers from his chapped lips addressed to you. _Heeey, Xanxus, I'm getting better. Hey, don't worry about this, I'll take care of it._

I'm not worried.

_Whatever! Don't bother yourself doing it, then, because I'll do it, I'll finish it, I'll do it better than anyone else! Heck, I'll do it better than you, even!_

Shut the hell up.

His name was Squalo. You wrote the name in air and told him mockingly that yes, you will remember it, like you do to everybody else. You didn't like him, he was too loud. He kept wanting to get your attention, wanting to get your opinions, wanting to take some indication that you're made up of something more human than stone.

You never forgot his name.

* * *

Unfrozen. After so many years of lying in wait, of planning, of letting your rage curdle and bubble over the edges of your sanity while firmly believing it can melt away your cage of ice.

As you stretched your arms and limbs again, you can't believe that it's his voice that you hear first:

"Welcome back."

...it's like the good old days came knocking at your door. Nothing has changed. You laughed; in the empty, broken halls of the dead and the forgotten it sounds full and raw and alive.

"So this isn't the end of the world."

Squalo grins. "No, of course not, you fucker."

...you think that's the first time you actually took the hand he offered you to help you stand back on your feet.

Perhaps you don't have to use your words as wards anymore. Perhaps the world isn't as unprofitable and wasteful as it seems. Perhaps this boy is no longer a mutt in your eyes, no longer childish.

Perhaps...

* * *

Then, remember: a snapshot in memory.

...there was once a boy. And he stood in your young painting of the world because he glowed with a determination to follow you, _follow_ you.

You're secretly glad you never forgot his name, and you know that (secretly) he knows about that too.

* * *

Sometimes, you can't sleep. Ten years into the future and still there are times where you wander the halls of Varia's mansion in your black, silk pajamas like a lost child.

You want something warm. In the kitchen, Squalo was there, pillaging the contents of the fridge.

He looks at you and then he understands.

"Want tea?"

"Yeah."

The silence is comforting. There's a glass half-filled with water near your hands that shines underneath the chandelier's lights, waiting to be thrown. Squalo's alert and knows that in a split second, the glass could make its way to your hand and onto the air, eventually connecting to his head.

Tonight was not one of those nights where he sleeps in his bed with a lump on his head, because some people are lousy at showing their gratitude and thanks.

He comes back with a small teacup with steaming tea. Barley tea, which always tasted weird in his tongue but nevertheless calms the boss anyway, so he never complains. Just sets it softly in front of you and watches you close your eyes and sip it slowly, savouring the warmth in your cup of lips, in your seductive but compulsively harsh mouth.

"You can be such a baby sometimes. Sometimes I feel that you're paying more because of my baby-sitting abilities rather than my swordsmanship and assassination methods." Squalo rolls his eyes at you, but smirks and sits down close to you anyway.

"...have you been talking to the Cavallone again?"

"No. I just noticed it."

"What's wrong with that? You're ensuring the happiness of your Boss. If anything, all of you in the Varia should get paid depending on a scale of zero to ten on how well you all make me happy."

"In that case, we'll all get zero, then, because you're too fucking hard to please."

"Of course," you say. There's an oddly warm feeling that flutters in your stomach that you mercilessly ignore.

He escorts you back to your room. You know that those slight touches upon your hands and shoulders are not accidental. You know that they mean something else.

"Goodnight."

The two of you enter your room.

"Goodnight."

There's a smile that graces your face as you turn the lights off and kiss him; and all manners of other sweetness, of passion and all things that make you burn were hidden in the dark.

Goodnight.

* * *

originally for demanawaits from lj.


End file.
